The Kazakh government will seek investors to build or maintain 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) of roads at a projected cost of 541 billion tenge ($4.5 billion) in exchange for operating concessions, the Transportation Ministry said.Roads in Kazakhstan, the world’s ninth-biggest country by territory, have always been a persistent problem both in Soviet times and afterwards. A number of multi-million road  projects, funded by state budget - like autobans Almaty-Astana - failed with funds lost and stolen. Additional allocations of petromoney from the National Fund is suggested by some public figures, but, perhaps, concessions - with private investors building the roads which will bring them dough (and there fore have to be of a good quality) - is the only way to do it well in this country of opaque schemes that always accompany governamental spendings. 

One of the roads will connect Astana with the regional mining center Karaganda. Two more roads will run from the financial capital Almaty to Kapchagai Lake and Khorgos on the Chinese border. The fourth road is a ring around Almaty - it was earlier given in a concession to KUAT construction company, which reportedly had bad problems with liquidity last year. The state may build a fifth road from Astana to the Borovoye resort.

Annual revenue from the roads may reach 30 billion tenge, with the charge to travel one kilometer ranging from 2.5 tenge for cars to 10 tenge for buses, the ministry said.

The government also plans to upgrade 2,552 kilometers of roads at a cost of 900 billion tenge to create a highway that would allow freight from Chinese manufacturers to be delivered directly to European markets. The first phase of the upgrade will cost 789.3 billion tenge and is scheduled for completion by 2013. A second phase will be done by 2016. Investors from China, South Korea, Israel and Hungary have indicated interest in the upgrade project, the ministry said.